Ames Caucuses Get Under Way

Signs for Ron Paul and Rick Perry lined the driveway leading to the main entrance of Ames Middle School greeting residents for the 7 p.m. start of the caucuses.

In 2008, the school housed both Republican and Democrat caucus sites and it teemed with college students.

This go around the school is the site for five of 20 Republican precincts in Ames and had fewer young people in the band room and commons room and auditorium.

Party officials expected more than 400 people to cast ballots at this precinct tonight. After registering, all voters were handed pre-printed ballots and could mark an “X” next to the name of the candidate they are supporting.

There was a blank line for write-ins and Herman Cain’s name was still on the ballot even though he suspended his campaign in early December.

“We’re getting a fair amount of people changing parties,” said Dawn Canon, a volunteer at the caucus site.

By 6:30 p.m., 15 people had registered as Republicans who were with other parties before tonight.

In all, Story County hosted 43 caucuses. Some precincts met in the Ames High School, the one and only caucus site for Story County Democrats this year.

For some areas, results will be known in a matter of 30 minutes or so. Larger caucuses could take a couple of hours. That depends on how many candidate representatives speak, how long they drag on and how many votes need to be counted.

The GOP record for caucus-goers is 118,411, set in 2008, when Mike Huckabee won, followed by Mitt Romney, Fred D. Thompson, John McCain, Ron Paul and Rudy Giuliani. Patch will provide live coverage of the results as they come in.